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The Chosen Ones

I Need Some Input

Hey all! I would love to hear back from you the readers about some events occuring with Ralf the Destroyer. There have been more than a few friends in the web comic world who have suggested that Ralf would look even better in color. I myself enjoy both black and white and color comics, but have typically leaned towards black and white because newspaper comics were my first love and color is simply more work.

Well a new development has once again put more pressure than I can resist on the issue of color, Bill Kellogg (of Tundra & Inkbottle Syndicate fame) asked if I would be interested in having Ralf the Destroyer distributed in their new project, Funnies Extra . That’s right, Ralf the Destroyer is going to be in newspapers!… and in color. The above strip is the sample I submitted to be included in their promotional issue. So now would be a great time to ask your local paper if they are going to include Funnies Extra and Ralf the Destroyer in their content!

Finally I would like to run something by I’ve been considering: Would you be interested in a Member’s section that included color strips and/or a weekly color long form comic book page?

Thanks Fred! There is a bit of a disparity between coloring for newsprint and coloring for digital. Since it’s for print, I colored this strip the same way I colored “Nancy” for many years where as the site banners are colored for digital output. I might be inclined to use the “digital banner” coloring for a long form page which might see better quality printing later on though.

Hmmm, wow, that is a moral dilemma! You have done a terrific job with black and white so far, and it kinda gives it a classic feel, kinda like the old B&W horror films of the past… (With poor Ralf as the victim! =^^= )

But the color looks really good too! (The only thing I could nitpick in this “colorized” strip is that you can tell that the squad car was previously “colored” with the cross hatch, makes it a little too dark…

Outside of that, color opens up a lot of rich possibilities, I really liked how this strip turned out in color!

Hey Tbolt, thanks for the encouragement! I would probably continue to publish the B&W with an occasional Sunday as I am now, color would be additional or extra content. But like I said at this point I’m just trying to get a feel for what people like or don’t.

The color is good, but I like black and white better. I agree with the idea for B+W weekdays and a Sunday color comic. It reminds me of the old Garfield and Calvin and Hobbes comics, those good ol’ days when comics weren’t so tiny you can hardly see ’em!!! *Laughs*

I don’t like the idea of a “Members Page”, it seems to complicate things and I’d rather have another comic than have to wait ages for you to set up a new page for members and then color in all the comics… You know? It just seems like an inordinate amount of work on your part, and it doesn’t really affect the likableness of your comic.

It would be nice to see Ralf the Destroyer in the local newspapers! I dunno if our newspaper would carry it, people are very poor here, but I’ll check it out nonetheless!

Hey Mini! I am a fan of the more Nostalgic approach to comics myself and it is a lot of work, but the main reason I’m considering it is:

a) This new venture with Funnies Extra has me color dailies anyhow.

b) I was considering adding the long form back story I’ve developed for comic books.
In the case of “b” I have been selling mini comic books along with the books and the mini comics are pretty popular at conventions. I figured I could post a long form page each week to get me on schedule and have minimally two issues by the year’s end. I could then later bind them up as graphic novels.

c) I would only do any of this based on it not altering what is already working here on the site (like adding a category to a blog). I might have to update the Comicpress aspect of the site soon (some have noticed the glitches) but that’s the only big revision anytime soon. I appreciate your concern for myself and the strip and I am very pleased to hear that “as is” Ralf has achieved a fine degree of likableness!

As far as the “Funnies Extra” goes, my understanding is that it’s free to papers as long as someone can get local advertising for it. I have a “press release” I’ll post in the “News” section for those interested.

I think that we’re in agreement that it would be great if you were to do black and white for the strips put up on normal days of the week and a colored one on Sunday. I could honestly care less about whether the comic is colored or not, for as long as I’m still able to enjoy reading it I will read it. As far as trying to color it every day, if you think you’re up for it and can keep it up you should go for it. However, do not over work yourself. I’ve seen it happen several times where a web comic artist tries something new but it becomes to much work for them to handle in trying to keep up with their normal update schedule. Determine a pace with which you think you’ll be comfortable maintaining and take it from there.

Congrats on getting Ralf into the papers, by the way. I would love to see it in my local paper, but then again I rarely read the paper to begin with.